NFC Times Exclusive: While banks gearing up for NFC launches are keenly interested in host-card emulation, as this week’s NFC Times story about planned NFC launches in France notes, a number of banks in France and elsewhere do not plan to wait until HCE is mature enough for commercial rollouts.
They will launch on NFC SIMs. And despite their attention-grabbing support for HCE, announced in February, Visa and MasterCard Worldwide continue to support secure elements and will even subsidize TSM and SIM rental fees in some countries or regions, such as Central Europe, NFC Times has learned.
To be sure, some, if not most, of the same banks planning to put their applications on NFC SIMs could move to HCE later.